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Afterward the farmer met the pair again, and while the girl smiled and said, "Howdy, Uncle Joe?" the lawyer turned away and looked down the river. It was the last time that a smile was seen on Stella's face. A few evenings later she was seen standing on Sunrise Rock, with her look bent on Chattanooga.
On the 19th of October, after turning the command over to Thomas, General Rosecrans quietly slipped away from the army. He submitted uncomplainingly to his removal, and modestly left us without fuss or demonstration; ever maintaining, though, that the battle of Chickamauga was in effect a victory, as it had ensured us, he said, the retention of Chattanooga.
General Gordon Granger, with three brigades of infantry and one division of cavalry, guarded the Union left and rear and the gaps leading to Chattanooga, and was to act as general reserve for the army and lay well back and to the left of Brannan's Division that was supporting the front line of General Thomas.
These men I left in Knoxville to await the arrival of my train, which I now learned was en route from Chattanooga with shoes, overcoats, and other clothing, and with the rest of the division proceeded to Strawberry Plains, which we reached the latter part of December.
All the details of the battle of Chattanooga, so far as I was a witness, are so fully given in my official report herewith, that I need add nothing to it. It was a magnificent battle in its conception, in its execution, and in its glorious results; hastened somewhat by the supposed danger of Burnside, at Knoxville, yet so completely successful, that nothing is left for cavil or fault-finding.
Having seen enough, we returned to Chattanooga; and in order to hurry up my command, on which so much depended, I started back to Kelly's in hopes to catch the steamboat that same evening; but on my arrival the boat had gone. I applied to the commanding officer, got a rough boat manned by four soldiers, and started down the river by night.
On the way he used the telegraph and the mails, and suggested or ordered such steps as would relieve the place, for the Army of the Cumberland, shut off from supplies, was in desperate straits, sick and famished. Reinforcements were hurried, and the result of his preparations was the decided victory of the battle of Chattanooga and Missionary Ridge.
The march of McCook's corps from Valley Head to Alpine was in pursuance of orders directing it to advance on Summerville, the possession of which place would further threaten the enemy's communications, it being assumed that Bragg was in full retreat south, as he had abandoned Chattanooga on the 8th.
But Thomas declined to take over the command, and on the eighth of October Buell fought Bragg at Perryville. There was no tactical defeat or victory; but Bragg retired on Chattanooga. The Government now urged Buell to enter east Tennessee. He protested that lack of transport and supplies made such a move impossible. William S. Rosecrans then replaced him. Buell was never employed again.
"From what I hear to-night it is evident that General Mitchell captured Huntsville to-day, which is one day sooner than we expected him to do it. We must cut all telegraph wires and then run the train northward to Chattanooga, and from there westward until we meet Mitchell advancing towards Chattanooga on his way from Huntsville.
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